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Blur

Saturday, 26 December 2015

What are you doing on V-Day? If you're a Sleater-Kinney fan, you'll be at this sold out show. According to my bad memories and physical ticket stubs, I've seen Sleater-Kinney at least three times, and have expressed sadness ...

We covered Trampled By Turtles' first ever Festival Palomino last year. It was such a great learning experience for us, and we had a great time... so much that it made it onto my top ten favorite shows from 2014 (out of …

Beautiful: The Carole King Musical is a musical on the life of songwriter Carole King, based on the biography written by Douglas McGrath. The musical has a residency at the Orpheum Theatre in Minneapolis until the end of November. …

This year (2015), W♥M covered 346, which is an absolutely amazingly large number considering that we basically don't cover shows from December to February.

With so many shows, it's hard to just pick 15 shows to talk about... and I know there are a few that I feel bad about leaving off the list. I recommend looking over our list below and clicking on the shows you are most interested in reading and checking out for yourself.

This was my fourth time seeing Portland's Sleater-Kinney, and it was possibly my favorite. After "breaking up" in 2006, it was a bit of a surprise when they announced their reunion in October 2014 (with a new album No Cities to Love no less!). Of course, their entire 2015 North American show immediately sold out, but we were lucky enough to be there.... as were all the dedicated fans (who we haven't seen in quite a while).

We wrote, "I also wanted to mention that this wasn't just a SK reunion, but a reunion for all their fans. Personally speaking, I saw old friends I have not seen in nine years and it was all because SK came back to the music scene... so from the bottom of my heart, thank you Sleater-Kinney. "

Similar to Sleater-Kinney, beloved The Decemberists disappeared from the music scene in 2011.
We caught singer Colin Meloy solo in 2013, and although he did play some Decemberists songs, it just didn't feel the same. When the opportunity to see them live, after they announced an unexpected new album What a Terrible World, What a Beautiful World, we jumped on board on the sold out show.

Their encore, with a giant whale, was a delight: "...then was a direct hit to the gullet, with their other folky mega-epic, the bouncy ‘The Mariner’s Revenge Song’ which stretched some twenty minutes. People were prompted to scream at a certain part ¾ of the way into the song, and the reaction was not unwarranted as a large cut-out profile of a whale ambled on stage to slowly eat each of the band members in a row, to the crowd’s shrieking delight."

My all-time favorite post-Britpop is Scottish band Belle & Sebastian. Although the band experienced some difficulties with their label (basically Jeepster Records didn't think they can grow beyond their cult-like status) and losing a few key band members (including sweet songstress Isobel Campbell), the band seemed to be in top form on this 2015 tour. They first hit the Enmore Theatre in Sydney, Australia, and eventually made their way to Minneapolis at Rock the Garden.

Personally speaking, as a diehard fan, I felt it wasn't their strongest performance in Minneapolis. They've been gone for 9 years from the city, and their song choices weren't what I wanted or expected. Still, despite all that, their two song finales were unfortgettable: "The two closing tracks, ‘The Boy With the Arab Strap’ and ‘I Didn't See It Coming’ were absolutely unforgettable. Murdoch walked on the front barrier and asked if anyone wanted to dance and encourage fans to come on stage. About thirty fans jumped to the stage and just had an absolute blast singing and dancing... and, yes, taking plenty of selfies."

We were lucky enough to have caught Sam Smith right before his road to stardom: winning six Grammy Awards (in Feb 2015) - including Record of the Year and Song of the Year - and Brit Award winner for British Breakthrough Act and Global Success.

We wrote, "With his career just starting (though he mentioned he’s had a manager since age 12) and a strong chance that he walks away with several Grammys next weekend, Sam Smith’s local debut was worth the wait, with likely several more appearances in the years ahead, to come."

The second annual Wizard World Minneapolis was a whole lot of fun. Unlike 2014's show, this year they had a few musical acts in conjunction to the comic book/geek fandom show: Critical Hit and our favorite Japanese Superhero band Peelander-Z. Unfortunately, due to a misunderstanding, the Peelander-Z show was cut short.

As we reported, "After just 25 minutes, the venue cut off the band's instruments!! Everyone in the audience and the band looked incredibly puzzled by the shutdown. The fans were screaming "One more song! One more song!" and Pink replied, "If only we could, but they won't let us play!"

After Brian Ritchie sued singer Gordon Gano in 2007, The Violent Femmes broke up. It was only recently (2015) that they reformed, so we were more than happy to make that long drive to Treasure Island Casino in Red Wing, Minnesota, to see them. Embarrassingly enough, I thought this was my first time seeing VF, until I was reminded by a friend of mine that we had seen them in early 2000 at First Avenue. Suddenly, the memories flooded back! I will confess that I have a terrible memory.

Anyway, seeing VF was such fun! Everyone in the audience were singing to every word (expect for the two new songs), but I will also mention that I LOVE Colin Hay (from Men At Work) and he was definitely the highlight of the Barenaked Ladies' set. BNL aren't bad either, they were surprisingly a very entertaining band.

We wrote, "Say what you will about Canada's Barenaked Ladies, but they are a great live band. All those years touring, singer Ed Robertson has developed an amazing ability to randomly improvise some raps and songs. My personal favorite was the "Ring Ding Ding for Red Wing" rap, it's clear to me that they just actually thought of it while randomly shouting out rhymes."

We were quite impressed with Go 96.3's very first show at Aria in early March 2015 (featuring New Politics and Banks). They spared no expenses, and it showed! They would later go on to book Go Fest 2015 (featuring Cold War Kids and Matt & Kim on 07 August 2015) and Go Snow Show (featuring Metric and Silversun Pickups on 03-04 December 2015). In fact, all the Go Shows are nothing less than spectacular. We speculate that they are possibly just losing money (thanks to their affordable pricing of "$9.63" or FREE), but we also think that getting their brand name out is well worth it.

We wrote, "So, with little Snow outside, but plenty Show inside, consider the inaugural Go96.3 Snow Show a success with the hope that this becomes a bigger and better holiday tradition, for years ahead. "

Legendary Britpopster Blur is finally back in Australia, playing their first gig in 18 years in the country. The whole gang is back (including Graham Coxon), and we love the band so much, we travelled to Los Angeles and New York for Blur's final two US tour. It's hinted heavily that this was the band's final U.S.A. appearance. A sad reminder that for this megastar band in England... that they never really broke America.

We wrote, "I'll just say the show was bittersweet. Albarn plans to spend next year working on the band that did break the States, Gorillaz, and he has enough side projects to distract him from the band he first started out in. This may be their last concert in the country they couldn't break."

FFS is the special project of Franz Ferdinand and Sparks. The two bands recorded an album and as expected with these type of one album-only tour, they basically played the entire album. As an added bonus, selective songs from their respective catalog was also played, including the wildly popular FF's song "Take Me Out" (the entire audience was bouncing and singing along to this number).

Of all the places the band could have chosen to play, they surprisingly added Minneapolis to their limited first-ever US tour... and it was well worth it for fans who showed up to catch this unique performance.

As we reported, "Both bands collaborated to produce some of the most interesting pop songs on the FFS album. It's smart, it's catchy, it's fun, and it's uniquely FFS. While I do not think there will be a sequel in the future, this was, by far, the most interesting team-up we've seen in a while."

This is one of our favorite 2015 shows: Big Star's Third. Every show they do is different, mainly because they have different guests. With all these great guests, you would think they can easily screw up, but they were all surprisingly well-rehearsed and seemed to know their material and what they had to work with.

We concluded, "This show was such a massive pleasure to watch. Between a stage loaded with talent and music loaded with emotion, it was hard to walk away from this and not be inspired and heartened. Big Star created some of the most beautiful and timeless music of all time, the soundtrack to our lives. Stamey, Stringfellow and every single person who contributed to Wednesday night’s performance brought that soundtrack to life. "

This was our third time seeing The 1975, fifth time if you count their two promotional appearance at Cities 97 and the Mall of America... and we called it long ago: This band is going to be massive! Not only have they sold out every appearance in the Twin Cities, but ahead of their sophomore album, they've already announced a date at the Roy Wilkins Auditorium. We think it's going to sell out, which very few bands have managed such a feat. We'll wait and see. If you need further proof that the band has made it - after we saw them at First Avenue, there were bootleg T-Shirt vendors!

As reported, "From the show’s early sell out, to the stage production, and the crowd’s intense reaction to every song, it was clear right away that the band has outgrown its club confines and is destined for bigger things (something we predicted when we first saw them too)."

We felt that the inaugural Festival Palomino last year was nothing short of perfect... however, the organizers (First Avenue and Trampled by Turtles) improved on perfection! We love the new setup and, based on these two successful shows, we're pretty sure they will be hard at work on a great 2016 Festival Palomino.

We praised, "If local festivals were racehorses, Festival Palomino is best in show. Again.

The Trampled by Turtles-curated festival, held again in the inside greens of the horse racetrack at Canterbury Park in the southwest suburb of Shakopee, triumphed once more in its sophomore year, as a prime example of a highly enjoyable, expertly-run day of music. "

This was an odd-pairing, but we were really excited about UK's The Adicts' very first Minneapolis show. They were just super-duper entertaining. The band clearly has their live show down to a T, incorporating various fun stage props, various costume changes, and choreographic dance routines. The only down side to these shows is that they are practically the same routine every night, so if this is your second or third time seeing them, it'll get old fast... but personally speaking, since it was their first Minneapolis show: we loved it.

Worth the price of admission: "If anything, The Adicts is one of the most entertaining bands touring right now. I've never seen so many stage prop used on stage, from pounds of confetti (used in streamers, umbrellas, hats, etc.) to Chinese take-out cartons (used for "Chinese Takeaway"), playing cards (used for "Joker in the Pack") to light-up plastic glass (used during "Who Spilt My Beer?") to various costume changes (hats, gloves, shirts) to beach balls, to stuffed monkeys (thrown into the audience). Although this may seem gimmicky, you can't ignore that this was a first-rate production and worth the price of admission. "

We're big fans of Weezer since 1994. Admittedly, the band's outgrown us, but we still have a soft spot for the nerdy band. Seeing them at Burgerama IV in Santa Ana was a treat, but because Rivers' dad came on stage to sing "Back to the Shack" with the band. We caught them again locally at Basilica Block Party, and it's probably our favorite Basilica show in recent memory.

The fans loved it, "As soon as the first few chords of ‘Hash Pipe’ were played, the audience immediately recognized it and started screaming and singing. Other big hits blocks included ‘Surf Wax America’, followed by ‘Island in the Sun’ with personalized "Minneapolis" lyrics, and ‘Beverly Hills’ (which did gangbuster in California, but surprisingly did really well in Minnesota as well)."

This one is still fresh in my mind, so it's one of my favorite music event I've attended. I can probably count on my hand the few plays and musicals I've attended (The King and I, Macbeth, A Christmas Carol, etc.), but watching Beautiful: The Carole King Musical was simply just magical. The seamless set changes, the constant costume changes (and one great "quick change" costumes), the great singing and music playing... they were just flawless! It probably helped that they act the same scene night after night for the last 200+ shows, but it was still pretty amazing to witness live. I have told people that it is like watching a movie, only it's completely live.

We concluded, "If you're a fan of live musical, you definitely will want to attend a show. It is a lot of fun, and the musical numbers will bring back a lot of wonderful memories."

After the release of The Magic Whip (first album since Think Tank was released in 2003), this world tour sees Blur play Australia (including the Splendour in the Grass festival in Byron Bay) …

It seems Damon Albarn of Blur has felt the years-long sting of not quite being able to translate the band's massive popularity in their native England into the same success in the more elusive U.S.

Damon Albarn in Los Angeles

Playing only two dates in North America at ambitiously large venues -- the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles and Madison Square Garden in New York -- Albarn seemed to be making a statement: we were meant to be legends here, too. Neither show sold out, despite impressive turnouts of diehards from Britpop's '90s heyday to younger late converts and just fans of the pub-by hit "Song 2" (the one where you scream "Woo-hoo!" after your team wins).

Since I'm one of those diehard fans, I'll just say the show was bittersweet. Albarn plans to spend next year working on the band that did break the States, Gorillaz, and he has enough side projects to distract him from the band he first started out in. This may be their last concert in the country they couldn't break.

This may be their last concert...

The band stuck mostly to their set list from L.A., with the addition of the beautiful, swelling pop ballad "End of a Century" and the random, fuzzed-out buzz of "Country Sad Ballad Man," with a blistering, trancelike solo from guitarist Graham Coxon. Fans all around the Garden flashed their cellphone lights in tribute to "Tender," a touching moment likely for fans and band alike. With no Fred Armisen as in L.A., Albarn announced that comedian Mike Myers was also approached but unable to stand in for Phil Daniels on "Parklife." Instead, a small group of fans came onstage, with one lucky young woman giving her all for the first verse while Damon filled in the rest. From "There's No Other Way" to "Go Out," the rest of the setlist was mostly a survey of singles from their catalogue (though sadly missing that charming, silly love song, "Ong Ong" from their most recent The Magic Whip.)

They can jump and thrash in fits, but this is a band that's mellowed with age, in song and in spirit. It's definitely nothing to be ashamed of -- nor, Damon, is your inability to "break America" with Blur. These are a fan's notes, and my heart soared, I sang along, and I was grateful.

Blur drummer Dave Rowntree would like very much to prove that adage wrong, as according to NME, he'll run as a Labour Party candidate for the local council election in his Marylebone …

"Sorry we haven't been back sooner, Sydney"...."18 years!". Hang on a second... it has been 18 years since Blur played the Hordern Pavilion (that's 1997 for those who need some friendly Sunday morning maths assistance).

After the release of The Magic Whip (first album since Think Tank was released in 2003), this world tour sees Blur play Australia (including the Splendour in the Grass festival in Byron Bay) for the first time in 18 years!

Playing to a very nearly sold out crowd, Blur played a mixed bag from all eight of their albums, complete with backing singers and a four-piece (at least it looked like four from where I was standing) horn section. There's No Other Way, Trimm Trabb, Trouble in the Message Centre, Parklife, Coffee and TV and of course the crowd pleasing, Song 2; all the hits were played. (No Country House... but not sad about it)

As the tour is off the back of the release of The Magic Whip they unsurprisingly played a handful of songs form the new album. I'm not sure about the rest of the crowd, but although I do love the album, songs like Go Out, Lonesome Street and Thought I Was a Spaceman, really didn't strike the same chord in me as the older songs did.

I could not pick a fault with the show in terms of musicality. Each song played faultlessly.... except for the moment at which Graham managed to land a forward roll (whilst playing guitar), but had to miss a few notes whilst readjusting his strap. Damon was his relentlessly energetic self, Alex (dressed only in a t-shirt and shorts... dude! It's winter here!) was having an amazing time strutting his stuff for the pleasure of everyone right of stage, Graham's guitar playing was executed seemingly effortlessly and Dave... well, he's still Dave (face obscured by cymbal for the whole show, but i assume his only changed minimally).

I would also like to mention how pleasant it actually was being in the crowd. It was a significant difference from my last Blur experience: being 17 and frantically trying to be as close to the front as I could be; almost dying of heat exhaustion (I can only imagine how revolting i must have looked to anyone caught a glimpse - not that I cared); and being intermittently saturated by Damon's endless supply of "crowd water".

These days "crowd water" is still being widely thrown, but I felt no jostling or pushing. Just people happy to be there. There was even a "celebrity" sighting or three; with the dudes from Top Gear hanging side of stage. Didn't Jeremy Clarkson get the boot from that show? Who knows... who cares? Anyway, I digress....

After a mammoth two-hour set, one of two things were obvious from Graham's cheeky smiles and other facial expressions during the encore (where they played some of the classic singles: Stereotypes; Girls and Boys; For Tomorrow; and ending on a slow tune with The Universal) that Graham was either jetlagged and ready for a nice sit down, or he had played those songs so many times before that he had gone into auto-pilot mode and his mind was completely elsewhere. Either way, I was not disappointed (which is clearly evident, because the nanna in me usually gets annoyed during the short wait before an encore and is half way home before the band has finished).

Oh.. and support act? Sorry Jamie T, but I had to drink some beers in a pub down the street whilst you were playing; but by all reports you were pretty good and if time machines were a thing, I'd definitely turn up earlier to watch you.

Wednesday, 09 April 2014

April 2014 is the 20th anniversary of Britpop, according to BBC6 and Radio 1.
This whole month, we are devoting W♥M Radio to our love of Britpop. …

April 2014 is the 20th anniversary of Britpop, so all month we're dedicating our show to the wonderful movement.

NOTE: This was originally shot on video, so if you want the visuals, you'll have to see it on YouTube. Because of YouTube's overly aggressive copyright policies, the music portion was taken out. Absolutely no thanks to Geffen Records.

Fleet Foxes was first called Pineapple, but they had to change the name since there was another local band going by Pineapple.

Elastica originally called themselves Onk and Vaseline (but they had to change it when The Vaselines threatened them legally). So in 1993, they became Elastica.

Radiohead was called On A Friday in 1995 because that's when they met to rehearse.

Oasis originally named themselves after a Beatles song called "The Rain", so the band name was Rain.

Blur was called Seymour

Coldplay originally started as Pectoralz, and then changed their name to Starfish.

Pink Floyd had several names: Sigma 6, The Meggadeaths, The (Screaming) Abdabs (or Architectural Abdabs), Leonard's Lodgers, The Spectrum Five and The Tea Set.

The Detour became The Who in February 1964... then that summer they changed their name to The High Numbers. When that didn't take off, they changed their name back to The Who.

Bjork was in several bands before going solo: Spit and Snot, Sugarcubes, and Gling-Gló,

SINEAD O'CONNORO'Connor will be in America to do a series of residency dates in November 2013. Originally the tour was to take place in 2011, but that was quietly canceled due to various personal reasons. See complete tour dates on our previous article.

FATHER JOHN MISTYRyan's last gig was for Father John Misty (you can read more about him here). Seems like FJM will be returning to life on the road later this year:

Jennifer writes that the film was "Stuart’s story of the forming of Belle and Sebastian", so if you love B&S, it's definitely worth looking into.

As for the rest of God Help the Girl:
Asya who appeared on GHTP is currently in Chaos Chaos, but previously in Smoosh.

Neil Hannon (aka Divine Comedy) who appeared on the GHTP album is in a project called The Duckworth Lewis Method. Their new album Sticky Wickets came out last month, July 2013.

T.A.T.U.Ryan tries to forget t.A.T.u. rather unsuccessfully. No idea what the two Russian girls are up to these days, but Vu is still in love with Julia Volkova.

Apparently there was a t.A.T.u. reunion four or five years ago. Then as recently as in last year, in various interviews Julia and her t.A.T.u. partner Lena Katina does not keep in contact. That's is untrue, apparently the two will team-up once more to play Kiev (Ukraine) on September 27th, while Lena is playing Hangar 110 in Sao Paulo on November and Cologne in Germany
October 5-6th.

Julia recently appeared in a few singles in 2012:
Lyubov Suka/Back to her Future and Любовь-Сука (feat Dilma Bilan). She also appeared in a film called "Zombie Fever". Lena will be releasing a new solo album in 2013.

CLOUDThe impossible to find Cloud band has an album called Comfort Songs that Ryan really loves. The album came out last week (August 5th) via Audio Antihero Records.

Song of the show is "Stomach Pit" from the album, which you can find more information on their bandcamp.

Bonus: XBONE or PS4? Cherie Currie from the Runaways is a 'cherry bomb'. Red Hot Chili Peppers could have been called Tony Flow And The Miraculously Majestic Masters Of Mayhem, or as Ryan would have it as TFATMMMoM.

Tuesday, 14 August 2012

With the Summer Olympic in London, fans flock Hyde Park to enjoy all sorts of sporting action on the giant screens and get a chance to catch some of our favorite British bands play live - for free!

Did you catch NBC's broadcast of the closing ceremonies of the 2012 London Olympic Games? We saw some of it last Sunday, and according to news reports, it was one of NBC's highest ratings (up 32% over the Beijing Games!)

Unlike NBC's clumsy attempt at censoring the opening ceremonies, it looks like they caved in to heavy criticisms and decided to air the closing music in its entirety.

The Closing Ceremony features a good wide range of British music. Personally, I was rather excited to see Pet Shop Boys doing their big hit song, "West End Girls," and the Spice Girls re-united again to do a medley of "Wannabe" and "Spice Up Your Life." Pop fans would note Take That and One Direction.

As much as I love Oasis, we got Beady Eye doing "Wonderwall." I got the impression that Liam didn't want to do a Noel Gallagher song, and they certainly made sure everyone knew they were 'Beady Eye,' not Oasis.

It was also a shame that Blur didn't make on the lineup (instead, they were playing over at BT London Hydepark), but Massed Bands of the Guards Division covered them with "Parklife." To me, "Parklife" is the quintessential Britpop song - that and Pulp's "Disco 2000" (which sadly no mention of Pulp or Jarvis Cocker.)

I also enjoyed the epic "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life," by Eric Idle - but couldn't they get the rest of Monty Python back together?

If you missed the Closing Ceremony, I'm certain you can buy the music compilation soon-ish. Already, you can pick up a double-disc of Isles Of Wonder: Music For The Opening Ceremony Of The London 2012 Olympic Games via Decca Recordings.

As I previously mentioned, I love Pet Shop Boys, and I have some news on them. They have a brand new album, Elysium, coming out on Astralwerks on September 11th.

If you can't wait that long, the first single, "Winner" is available on two digital bundles. The first will came out August 7th with three non-album b-sides (including a cover of the Bee Gees' "I Started A Joke") and the second is today (August 14th.)

Digital Bundle 1
1. Winner
2. A Certain "Je Ne Sais Quoi"
3. The Way Through The Woods (long version)
4. I Started A Joke

Sunday, 03 June 2012

For those of you that have followed Damon Albarns’s career, from Blur to Gorillaz and the various ins-and-outs along the way, Dr Dee won’t surprise you. Dr Dee is Damon Albarn’s new-ish album (released in may). It’s eighteen songs that were inspired by the life of John Dee, mathematician, polymath and adviser to Elizabeth I.

For those of you who may have not progressed past Damon’s involvement in Blur, Dr Dee probably isn’t for you. You wont hear a lot of Damon’s voice on this album, but you will hear some beautiful vocals and a small amount of bird-tweetery. Recorded late last year in Albarn’s West London studio and also in Salford with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra; it’s a true showcase of Damon’s ever-evolving composition and musical arrangement skills.

Don’t expect to be able to dance or even to sing along to this one. Just put it on and enjoy the ride, but make sure you’ve got your imagination ready, because it’s more like a soundtrack to a film than anything else I could possibly describe it as. You'd probably want to read up on the real Dr Dee if you feel like you'd actually like to know what it's all about.